Sometimes You're Better Off Lying
by Little Miss Insufferable
Summary: Curiosity gets the better of Clara after their trip to a cyberman-infested theme park, but are some things better left unspoken?


The TARDIS door fell shut with a soft thud, descending the console room into silence.

"Well… Three million angry cybermen to one side, I'd say that was an excellent day out." The Doctor exclaimed enthusiastically as he strolled up to the console in the centre of the room. Of course silence never lasted long with the 1200 year old time lord in the building. The man's mouth was non-stop, so much so that Clara was quite positive he even rambled in his sleep – not that she'd ever seen him asleep. Did he even sleep? She made a mental note to ask him some time.

"Oh yes. Brilliant, if you call visiting a planet inhabited by three million psychotic robot men intent on killing us all and a mad man playing a game of chess _with_ _himself _excellent." Clara threw back sarcastically as her hands dropped to rest on her hips.

"Well I did say three million angry cybermen to one side. And I won that game of chess, I'll have you know." He retorted defensively, pointing a finger at her to punctuate the sentence.

"No you didn't. The cyber planner said he'd have you in checkmate in five moves. If it wasn't for that pulse in your pocket, you'd totally have lost." A smirk crept onto Clara's lips as she took a step closer. "Against _yourself._"

"Yes… Well. That was always the plan. I just needed to keep him distracted long enough to carry it out." The Doctor's eyes moved shiftily as he rambled the response; to which Clara flashed him another knowing smirk.

"I know you. You never have a plan." With another pointed step closer, the impossible girl's smirk broadened further still, much to The Doctor's annoyance. He seemed to flail for a moment, opening and closing his mouth repeatedly before finally settling on two words:

"Shut up."

The Doctor's childish side that still sulked like a school boy whenever anyone managed to prove him wrong had well and truly escaped from its confinement as he turned away to face the console. Clara, meanwhile, stood watching with a triumphant smile on her lips.

As was a common occurrence in the TARDIS, The Doctor seemed to lose himself in the array of dials, switches and levers that made up the console. It was where he seemed most at home, Clara had noted the first time she'd stepped inside the room, here in the console room with the only companion never to have deserted him in all his eleven regenerations. She supposed it made sense really. To her the big blue box was nothing more than a time machine with a strange, unfounded grudge against her, but to him it had been the only constant in his life for the past 1000 or so years. He wouldn't be the doctor without his big blue box.

"Clara, could you pass me that shiny, round piece of gold metal to your right please?"

The sounds of The Doctor's voice jolted her out of her thoughts. Her brow furrowed ever so slightly as she noticed his absence from the spot she'd last been watching him in. It was only after she'd remained silent for several seconds and The Doctor had repeated himself that Clara realised he'd disappeared beneath the console to tinker.

"You mean this thing over here that looks a little like a door knob?" She asked for clarification.

"Yep, that's the one. Just drop it down through the gap in front of you." He assured her whilst tinkering with some piece of complicated metal or another.

Clara went one better and turned to head for the steps that led beneath the glass floor of the console room. She'd have dropped the small, door knob-like object in her hand straight down the gap but knowing The Doctor he'd be too busy playing with the TARDIS to pay attention and the thing would wind up hitting him straight in the head. That, and her wandering mind had conjured up one or two questions she was now itching to ask him.

"Doctor."

The sound of his name uttered so very close to his ear startled the Time Lord into action. His head collided with solid metal before his brain could reassure his body that it was Clara stood behind him and not some life-threatening, time lord-eating outer space monster.

"Doctor, are you okay?" Clara's voice rang out, tinged with slight concern as her head tilted curiously to one side.

"Yes, perfectly fine." He responded as he backed away from the console and slowly span to face his companion. One hand reached up to rub absentmindedly at his wounded head and his face contorted into a wince. "Ow- okay. Not fine."

Clara rolled her eyes in response to The Doctor's whining and took a step closer. For a man as old and supposedly wise as he was, she spent an awful lot of her time mothering him after he'd managed to shut his hand in a door, or stub his toe on something or other.

"Here. Let me take a look." Her voice took on its usual patronising tone adapted for situations such as this one as she set down the metal object in her hand. The Doctor obediently stepped closer and bent his head to allow her an adequate view of the top of his head.

"You're going to have to get closer. I'm not on stilts." Clara complained with a small, and slightly adorable, huff. The Doctor cut off that thought before it could expand further. Adorable and Clara did not belong together – absolutely not. Except when she wore that dress with the… _No._

"Better?" He asked as his knees bent to lower his head closer to his companion's level.

"Much." She responded as her fingers reached out to push through the thick mop of hair on his head. How on earth she was expected to see any sort of damage to his scalp with his hair in the way, Clara had no idea, but from what she could feel the only sign of injury was a small, barely noticeable lump. Not wanting to lose the pleasant sensation of his hair beneath her fingers just yet, she continued to rummage around as if searching for further injuries.

"Do you see anything?" The Doctor called out as he gazed down at the only part of her he could see – her feet.

"Not yet. Your great big mop of hair is too busy getting in the way." She half-lied with a small smile. God forbid she'd actually admit to adoring his great big mop of hair.

"Hey! There is absolutely nothing wrong with my hair." He huffed defensively in response; to which Clara only laughed amusedly.

"Doctor."

"Mmmm?"

Clara paused, wondering how to phrase her next sentence whilst her fingers continued to roam about The Doctor's scalp as though having taken on a mind of their own.

"You know those things you said earlier… Back on Cyberiad…" She started and trailed off as though he'd automatically be on the same wavelength.

The Doctor's brow furrowed. "What things? I say a lot of things… Did say a lot of things. It was a day of many things that were said. Not all of them by me, of course… Some of that was the Cyber Planner." He rambled in explanation, his body automatically straightening as he spoke and forcing Clara's hands to fall away from his hair. She appeared vaguely amused by his ramblings before her expression shifted into something more serious.

"You know… the things you said to me. _About_ me… Up in that castle." She explained further and deliberately shot him a pointed look.

"Nope. Still not ringing any bells." The Doctor feigned ignorance as he responded with a look that almost seemed to plead her not to go there. Unfortunately for him, his pleading would fall on deaf ears that evening… or whatever the time of day was supposed to be on board the TARDIS.

"When you said you were, and I quote, 'starting to like me in a way that's more than just…'" Clara trailed off, having not given him a chance to finish the sentence the first time around.

The Doctor instantly paled in response as his throat contracted in an uncomfortable swallow. He'd feared that the conversation was headed in precisely this direction and now that it had reached its destination, his expression had taken on the look of a spooked horse ready to bolt. "Yes…" He answered hesitantly, praying to anyone who would listen that the conversation would switch topics any second now or, failing that, the TARDIS would decide to spontaneously hurtle them across time and space. The TARDIS remained disappointingly silent on the matter.

"Was it true?" She asked finally. Curiosity had gotten the better of her and that small part of her head that conjured up images of The Doctor when she was too fast asleep to stop them had been focused on those brief few moments back there in the castle ever since.

The Doctor, for all intents and purposes, stammered his way into an incoherent mess. "Well- I mean… That is to say… We both know, naturally…. It was the cyber planner talking. Of course." He rambled in response in the hope that she'd be easily put off of the topic. Once again, luck seemed to have abandoned him.

"But that thing, the cyber planner, was in _your _head. You said so yourself, they don't have emotions… So how could it possibly tell me how it felt about me without any sort of exposure to real emotion?" Clara reasoned logically. She knew only too well she was pushing things further than they'd ever been pushed before – that The Doctor could freak out and dart off at any moment – but that nagging voice in the back of her head wouldn't rest until she knew for certain if her stupid, childish crush on the madman in his big blue snog box was completely and utterly unreciprocated.

For the briefest of moments, the Time Lord seemed to be at a loss for words. Had she not been to intent on hearing his answer, Clara might have opened the TARDIS door to check for any signs of a pig flying by in the vicinity, but her heart was pounding too loudly in her chest for her to pay much attention to flying pigs and odd silences.

"Clara, I-," The doctor started, his mouth opening and closing repeatedly as he tried to formulate a suitable response. "The cyber planner only told you what it thought you wanted to hear." He finished quietly as his gaze dropped down to the floor beneath his feet. Sometimes it was better to lie and if he kept his eyes trained downwards, he could almost pretend not to notice the look of disappointment that flashed across her face.

"Right- Of course. Silly of me really… That would never have been you." Clara answered, fighting to keep the hurt out of her voice. She didn't know why it bothered her – it hadn't particularly at the time – but perhaps this time what got to her was the certainty of the whole thing. Before she'd allowed herself some resemblance of hope that perhaps those feelings were The Doctor's own, even if they were buried well below the surface, but now… Now she felt like a school girl confessing to her first crush and being told that she wasn't pretty enough, or popular enough to be with the boy she'd decided she was going to grow up to marry. Now she wanted to run away and hide in her room for the night and try to pretend that The Doctor didn't really matter anyway – that she wasn't failing hopelessly at falling in love with him during every minute of every of the day.

"Goodnight, Doctor." She stated simply before turning on her heel and striding off towards the door to the TARDIS.

It was only once her back had turned that The Doctor finally looked up from the floor. He felt safe to look at her now that her face, the one undoubtedly brimming with hurt and disappointment, was safely averted from his gaze. He couldn't chance a look at her expression, knowing that just one glance would break his hard outer exterior and have him rushing over to comfort her like the soft old man he was beneath it all. He couldn't chance a look at her expression because he knew he'd open his mouth and tell her that he had no idea if it had been him or the cyber planner who had professed his feelings for her back there in the castle. He couldn't chance a look at her expression for fear of telling her just how beautiful, clever and so very, very _perfect _she was to him. But, most importantly, he couldn't chance a look at her expression knowing that he'd do anything just to take the pain away from it – including uttering those three words he'd promised himself a long time ago that he'd never say again.


End file.
